Kyle Eggleton

Kyle is a rural general practitioner working for an iwi health provider in Northland. He is also a Senior Lecturer in the Department of General Practice and Primary Health Care. His research interests are in quality, access and equity issues.

Improving access to primary care is a critical component of reducing inequity. But how do we, as rural general practitioners, do this? In this keynote presentation Kyle Eggleton will draw from his research and experience of working as a rural general practitioner to argue that not only are rural GPs able to contribute substantially to reducing health inequity, we are also the medical profession that is most likely to succeed.

Strategies that we can implement involve analysing and reflecting on our relationships with our communities, on the interactions that patients have with our practices, on the personal connections that we make with patients and on the implicit beliefs that we hold. This conceptual framework of interventions targeting community, practice, person and self may provide a practical mechanism through which rural GPs can address inequity. Kyle will illustrate, with personal examples, how he has used this framework to improve access and equity in his own practice.